It's the Tuesday before Thanksgiving, and all you're probably thinking about right now is "I need to defrost the turkey, pick up another can of pumpkin filling, and vacuum before family arrives." That, and "are my clients' accounts ready for Black Friday, the busiest retail shopping day of the year?"

To ensure that you and your clients have a successful Black Friday, we wanted to use this Holiday Campaign Countdown post to share some quick last minute tips from our Optimization Specialists.

While Black Friday typically refers to in-store traffic, the retail industry has seen dramatic year over year increases in e-commerce sales and searches1. Analysts have also pointed to significant spikes in online shopping on Cyber Monday. The Monday after Thanksgiving yields sales spikes for e-commerce retailers2 and is fueled by promotions such as percent off sales, free gifts, and free shipping.

Our suggestions for any retail accounts (or others that might see this seasonal spike) before you leave the office for the Thanksgiving Holiday are:

Promotions - Be sure to highlight any promotions you have in your ad text whether they are Black Friday specific or not. If you have a discount on shipping or it is free, highlight this.

Budgets - Increase budgets across all campaigns to a comfortable level knowing that traffic spikes will be likely. Make sure ads keep showing when a user searches.

Bids – Modify bids on top performing and generic keywords knowing that competition on Black Friday/Cyber Monday will increase. Use the Bid Simulator to see what results you may get with different keyword maximum CPC bids, and consider using Conversion Optimizer to get as many profitable clicks as possible.

A few weeks ago, we announced a new tool designed to bring the power, speed, and relevancy of Google search to retail websites. With Black Friday (and Cyber Monday!) right around the corner we wanted to use this Holiday Campaign Countdown post to arm you with information for retail clients who may be shopping around for a new website search solution (pun intended).

As a hosted product, Google Commerce Search (GCS) installs quickly, scales effortlessly, and provides sub-second response times, even during seasonal traffic spikes. With advanced search features like spelling correction, automatic stemming, and custom synonyms, users will find what they're looking for without unnecessary clicks. Finally, Google Commerce Search is powered by the retailer's Google Merchant Center feed, streamlining implementation. Check out the full list of features in this overview video:

GCS provides visitors with an improved shopping experience, which can drive higher visitor-to-buyer conversion rates. While the conversion rates of most retailers is around 3%1, the best-performing sites have been able to achieve much higher conversion rates – even reaching double digits. Google Commerce Search can help bridge the gap between user expectation and on-site technology, while freeing retailers to do what they do best, creating and selling products.

We know that media buyers and planners are challenged daily to stay up to date on the products, tools, pricing models and ad formats for the myriad of media companies with which they work. To make Google's tools and products more accessible, we developed Creative Canvas: A guide to Google media solutions. The guide features the Google media products and tools, such as YouTube ad solutions, APIs, and OpenSocial, that have brought to life some of the most innovative and creative campaigns on the Google platform.

We've organized it by the categories planning, placing, extending and measuring to make it easy to find the right resource to get the job done. In addition, if you know exactly what you're looking for, you can find it in the index.

You may download the guide here. Have questions or feedback? Email sandbox@google.com.

For most, the holiday season is about giving; for some, though, it's unfortunately about taking - through scams, identity theft and more. With the holidays approaching, many of you are beginning to update your ads and content for a busy marketing season. Are you also checking that your systems are updated with the latest security patches? Do you know who has access to your account(s)? Is your account information/passwords strong and secure?

As part of our holiday campaign countdown series, we're pleased to bring you a webinar on Wednesday, November 18, 2009 at 11amPST highlighting account security best practices and tips to keep your campaigns running smoothly during this busy time. In this training, we'll cover common security techniques, review ways to identify suspicious internet behavior and suggestions on the best ways to protect your computer and your personal information. Additionally, learn about an existing Google feature that allows you to better manage your account and thus improve your account security.

If you live in the New York area, you may have heard or seen the so-called "Google surge," or Google Content Network blast that NY Mayor Bloomberg used to impact voters' decisions in the final hours of the mayor's reelection race. An increasing number of advertisers across industries, including auto, retail, and entertainment, have also used Google Content Network blasts to drive awareness of a new vehicle launch, viewer tune-in for a show, or traffic to an online contest with great success.

The Google Content Network blast entails serving up an advertiser's ads on multiple Google Content Network sites over a specific period of time, blanketing a particular geographic region, audience segment, or high traffic sites, depending on the advertiser's goal. On average, blasts can deliver 100 million ad impressions in 24-48 hours. But you're probably wondering what is special about Google Content Network blasts versus your typical portal homepage buy?

Google Content Network blasts deliver your message on a larger universe of sites than a single portal homepage, thereby reaching more of your customers. In a recent Google and TNS Compete study for a large automaker1, we found that Google Content Network blasts reach 58% of online auto buyers, which is 20% more than a top portal homepage2, and 23% of buyers were reached exclusively on sites available only on the Google Content Network2. In addition, 30% of auto buyers never went to one of the major portal homepages 6 to 9 months prior to purchasing their vehicle3. And the best part of all is Google Content Network blasts require no advance booking and deliver relevant ads at a much lower CPM than portal takeovers.

So, as we enter the peak holiday shopping season, consider how you're getting the word out on your merchandise and holiday offerings. Want to make a last minute big impression? Visit The Google Content Network site to learn more, and try out a Google Content Network blast for yourself.

1 Google, Inc. and TNS Compete study for large automaker, May 20092 Reach is based on a custom GCN site pack using a parameter of 2% buyer composition mix per site3 Based on observed clickstream behavior of buyers

Most of us can't imagine the web without search, yet when it comes to on-site search, the majority of websites are lagging behind. According to industry research, 85% of site searches don't return what the user sought1, and 22% of site searches return no results at all2. For clients who may have site search quality issues, leading to site abandonment, we have a cost-effective solution for you to share with them.

Google Site Search is a quick and easy way to add or improve website search capability. Hosted in Google's network of data centers, Google Site Search brings the speed, quality, and relevancy of Google search to sites with no on-premise hardware or software. Administrators can control the look and feel of the search engine, including optional Google branding and an XML API that allows for complete customization. New features like rich snippets, metadata refinements, top result and date biasing, and on-demand indexing make for a powerful search experience.

Starting at $100 per year, it's easy and affordable for clients to add Google Site Search to a blog or website of any size. To learn more and sign up, visit google.com/sitesearch today.

The latest enhancements to Google Ad Planner and DoubleClick's DART for Advertisers (DFA) bring new ways to help streamline your online display advertising workflow. With the newly launched DFA Analytics beta and beta integration of Google Ad Planner into the DFA platform, you'll now have a singular, seamless portal for planning, executing, and measuring campaigns -- with just one login. This unified set of tools, all accessible through the DFA platform, bring more efficiency to the campaign management process, saving valuable time and resources.

Beyond access enhancements, both DFA Analytics and Ad Planner also provide you with more data and more ways to analyze it. We've summarized the changes to each product for quick reference below, but be sure to check out the official DoubleClick and Ad Planner blog posts for full details.

The new DFA Analytics beta helps you:

Gain insights quickly. Interactive reports mean easier navigation through your accounts and data. You can model data in charts and graphs, as well as drill up and down through criteria such as advertiser, campaign, or targeting settings.

Get your reports faster. Reports update frequently - every few hours - and the new user interface enables you to access your data quickly.

Use new types of reports. Pull geographic delivery data. Additional reports show delivery data by bandwidth, browser, and operating system.

And Ad Planner's new capabilities now enable you to:

View subdomain data. See data including traffic estimates and demographics for the largest ten subdomains of any top-level domain. Once you identify subdomains to add, you can do so easily in Ad Planner.

See available ad placements while researching sites. You'll also be able to search for ad placements alongside domains on the "Search by audience" tab and see traffic and demographic estimates for each placement

Visualize audience data easily. Quickly compare reach and relevancy of sites you select with a new interactive graph.

Access more granular publisher data. With publishers now able to opt-in their Analytics data, you'll receive more accurate and specific information about their sites.

Use Ad Planner within DoubleClick DFA. Log in to your DoubleClick DFA account to access Ad Planner and have one tool for campaign planning, trafficking, and measurement. (Note: This feature is rolling out to all users over the next couple weeks)

If you haven't yet tried Ad Planner, give it a go at www.google.com/adplanner. And for more information on DART for Advertisers, visit DoubleClick.com and fill out an inquiry form.

Earlier this fall we launched Think2010 - an aggregation of resources highlighting perspectives on the changing face of marketing and strategies to help you prepare for 2010 and beyond.

It's been a few weeks since the Agency Blog team brought you an update on this initiative, so wanted to highlight some of the Think2010 resources now available:

Blog series - each week the Inside AdWords Blog team will be devoting a post to data, trends and tactics you can use to craft your 2010 strategy. Most recently, it featured an interview with Rick Carpenter from the agency DDB who shared the importance of focusing on the customer. Check out the blog series here.

Fast.Forward. - we're continuing to expand the volume of thought leader videos and consumer trend data on the Fast.Forward. channel, a joint effort between Google and the Wharton School. Watch highlights from our Think{Industry} events series (under "Videos" > "Industry") and use The Barometer (accessible from the "Trends" tab) to understand consumer sentiment on a daily basis.

Webinars - in addition to videos, we wanted to bring you opportunities to hear directly from industry leaders, such as Bonita Stewart, Managing Director US Sales, and Avinash Kaushik, Analytics Evangelist, via in-person webinars. Upcoming events and links to past sessions can be found on the Inside AdWords Blog as well as the Think2010 site.

You may remember that earlier this fall we announced the launch of Place Pages for Google Maps, which are web pages for every place in the world. Interested users can find relevant information, photos, directions, and reviews for their favorite places. Users will also see contextually targeted ads, and with the inclusion of Place Pages in Placement Performance reports, you'll now have insight into whether your clients' ads appeared on a Place Page and how they performed.

With this update, you can more closely monitor and optimize your clients' campaigns. While placement targeting is not available for Google Maps, you can increase the likelihood of appearing on Place Pages by increasing bids on high-performing keywords or by creating ad groups with highly specific keywords to target Place Pages relevant to your clients' products or businesses.

Webinar seats are limited so sign up today for the week of display. If you can't make the festivities, don't fret. All sessions will be recorded and posted to the training site after the week wraps up.

If you work with clients in the automotive industry, join us for our upcoming webinar, Driving International Success: Reaching Auto Consumers Globally.

We've partnered with NetPop to share new research for 17 key markets around the world. We'll explore the trends shaping auto buyer behavior across the globe to help inform and guide your marketing decisions. Register below for one of the upcoming dates.